A conventional facial tissue manufacturing line includes an unwind station incorporating large numbers of tissue web parent rolls, often one hundred or more. A web of tissue is unwound from each of these parent rolls and passed through a folder station which consists of a plow mechanism which folds each of the tissue webs and positions them on top of one another in stacked relationship. If desired, the webs may be interfolded during stacking. The folded stacked webs of tissue are then cut to provide individual stacks of discrete facial tissues which are subsequently boxed or packaged in some other manner.
The tissue webs from which the facial tissues are manufactured often include splices. Typically, such splices are made by splicing tape and it is highly undesirable for the splice to end up in the final packaged product furnished to the consumer.
To ensure that spliced facial tissue is not packaged and sold, a common practice has been simply not to splice parent roll breaks. A conventional detector system detects unspliced parent rolls as web breaks and the entire line is shut down for each break. This results in high-production cost and a great deal of wasted product.